Hey, firstly I just wanted to say thank you for answering this (and happy pride month)! Also, I'm cupio(bi)romantic. I just want to know, is it normal to feel bad about not feeling romantic attraction? I sometimes really want a girlfriend but at the same time, a lot of aspects of romance really make me uncomfortable (kissing mainly). I think I'd want a girlfriend in the future, but would it be a relationship if I don't like a lot of romantic things like pet-names or kissing at all? Thank you!

Happy pride month!

It sounds to me like you have some internalized arophobia about not feeling romantic attraction. Lots of aros (including me) have felt this, and I find that one of the best ways to deal with it is to acknowledge it and talk about it. Society hypes up romance so much, as this magical moment, this happy ever after, so if you’re aro, that sort of rhetoric can be really alienating and hurtful. But you’re not missing out on anything, because it’s usually overhyped, it’s not magical, it doesn’t lead to happy ever after. In a way, romantic attraction is kind of like sports: some people experience it and some people really like it, but there’s nothing wrong in acknowledging that it’s just not for you.

Have you heard of queerplatonic relationships (QPRs)? QPRs are a type of interpersonal relationship that can be a bit vague and confusing, but they’re nonromantic in nature and can (but don’t have to) include behavior one might find it romantic relationships like cuddling, living together, filing taxes together, raising children together, retiring together, etc, in addition to more “traditionally platonic” behavior like hanging out a bunch, trusting each other with secrets, etc. If you find that you’re kind of looking for a romantic relationship without the romance, you might find the idea of a QPR helpful. QPRs aren’t as widely known as romantic relationships, but they are just as “real” or official as romantic relationships, even though amatonormativity says otherwise.

Lastly, it’s not my place to tell you what labels to use, so no matter what, if you want to keep calling yourself cupioromantic, that’s fine. At the same time, if you found the idea of a QPR really helpful, and you decide that you want a QPR but not a romantic relationship, and this decision leads you to stop identifying as cupioromantic, that’s fine too.

Hope that helps, as always feel free to ask for clarification/any follow up questions.

So with the pridefall stuff thats gonna start tomorrow I wish you the best of luck stayung safe from that horrible movment and hope you have a wonderful pride month.

Thanks! I haven’t actually heard that much on Tumblr, and I’d expect I’d have heard some stuff about pridefall on other platforms if it was big, so I’m hoping that it was a bit of justified concern over nothing.

okay so,,, i have a squish on this guy and hes straight. im a dude as well and i love talking to him and djsnnsns get butterflies when im around him. but my friend group knows im aroace, so im afraid of saying smth about having a squish and im even more scared of him finding out about my feelings. what should i do??

Well, what do you want to do? If you’re happy the way things are, you don’t have to do anything. If you want things to change, think about the changes you want. Do you want to spend more time with him? Do you want to be affectionate with him? Do you want to cuddle with him?

If you have a list of different things you want, it might be helpful to order them by how comfortable you think he’d be with him. For example, I’d imagine that spending more time with him would likely be towards the front of the list, and being affectionate would likely be towards the end (although you won’t know unless/until you ask him). Once you have your list, you can ask him what he’d be comfortable with. It might be good to space out these requests, especially if he’s a bit unsure. (And obviously, if he doesn’t say yes to a request or seems uncomfortable at all, make sure you respect his boundaries.)

If you want him to understand that you’re not sexually or romantically attracted to him and/or that the motivation behind your feelings or ways you want things to change is platonic, it might be helpful to make sure he knows you’re aroace. If you’re going to ask him what behavior he’s comfortable with, I’d recommend waiting at least a couple days after coming out, since it might be hard for him to understand what it means to be aroace in general, as well as understand that you, specifically, are aroace.

You mention that your friend group knows you’re aroace, so you’re afraid of saying something. Are you worried that they’ll think you’re not aroace because of your squish? If so, you might find it helpful to talk about different kinds of attraction to help them understand the idea that feeling attraction while being aroace isn’t a contradiction. If you don’t want to start with platonic attraction, maybe you can start by talking about another kind of attraction you feel? For example, if you experience aesthetic attraction, you could talk about someone you think is really pretty but aren’t sexually or romantically attracted to.

Hope that helps, as always feel free to ask for clarification/any follow up questions.

I'm a bit confused about the word "squish". I have seen two definitions: someone you want to be friends with / someone you want to have a qpr with. Which one do you think is the more "correct" definition? Since I don't feel queerplatonic and alterous attractions, I couldn't use the word in the second context, but if it is the first, I can say I have some squishes. The meme you posted about the second squish got me a bit confused, but I love your account and your content! (sorry for the long ask)

Personally, when I use the word “squish”, I’m using it as a shorthand for the first definition. That is, I want to be close friends with my squishes, and the question of QPRs is irrelevant. Part of why I don’t use the second definition is that I don’t actually want to be in a relationship (including a QPR) with anyone, but I think that’s outweighed by how important the first definition was when it came to me understanding that I was aro; once I could reframe my attraction through the lens of squishes and friendship instead of crushes and romance, everything made a lot more sense to me.

With regards to the meme, it’s just about that thing that I experience (and I’d imagine other people experience it too) where I meet someone who’s super cool and then develop a squish on them when I already have a squish on someone else, so now I have two squishes. For me, a squish is an overall positive experience, but it often comes with some pining or nervousness or being flustered, so having two at once amplifies the aspects of a squish that are…not exactly negative, but just easy to complain about, I guess? The meme is kind of an ironic/joking complaint along the lines of “ugh. feelings are mean. what did i do to deserve having feelings for two people?”.

I hesitate to say that the second definition is “incorrect”, especially if there are people who are using it, but I can say that (at least anecdotally) it seems to be less common. Followers/rebloggers, what do you mean when you use the word “squish”?

[ID: At the top, text reads “Being genderflux like”. Below is a version of the seagull meme. The top portion, labelled “My brain”, shows a seagull leaning back and opening its mouth a lot. In the next panel, the seagull leans forward and screams “GENDER”. The bottom portion, labelled “Also my brain”, shows the seagull with its mouth closed. In the second panel, the seagull opens its mouth slightly and quietly says “gender?”. End ID]

I’d just like to say, happy pride to the people who often feel left out, to the straight trans people, to the bi people in m/f relationships, to the nonbinary people who present in a way that aligns with their assigned gender at birth, to the ace people, to the aro people

Youre all valid, you all matter, and I hope you have a happy pride month ❤🧡💛💚💙💜

people were angry when we said lesbians can be attracted to nonbinary people and not just women. they were wrong.

people were angry when we said bisexuals don’t have to be attracted to both or even either of the binary genders, and can just be attracted to a handful of nonbinary genders. they were wrong, too.

now, people are angry that we’re saying the ‘lesbian’ and ‘bisexual’ labels aren’t mutually exclusive, nor are any lgbtq+ labels as clear cut or strictly defined as they might seem. and guess what? they’re still wrong.

it takes time for people to learn, especially when their anger stems from a long history of unjustified erasure and pain, as well as fear that accepting new identities that don’t make sense to them will result in more pain and erasure.

one day, people will realize there are better things to worry about than people who use two labels that were never really mutually exclusive in the first place.

I promise ❤️

people were *also* angry when we said you can be both aroace and a lesbian. we faced a shit ton of backlash for identifying this way. but there hasn’t been a constant stream of discourse about us for a very long time.

I’m not generally an ace or aro positivity blog, but a friend of mine ran into some pretty harsh exclusionary rhetoric the other day and it’s on my mind. Here’s what I think I needed to hear myself once, on the off chance it helps anybody else.

===

To the ace or aro person reading this, whether you’re questioning your identity for the first time or you’ve been made to doubt who you are after living proudly for years:

You are ace enough.

You are aro enough.

You are queer enough, and you will always be a part of this community for as long as you wish, no matter what.

If you say you are, then you are. You’re not lying to yourself. Trust your gut to know who you are, or if you can’t, then trust the community that loves and supports you over the hateful words of a divisive few.

They’re your labels. You have a right to them. You are and will always be valid.

i’ve recently realised that i don’t actually ‘feel’ my afab and i have been looking in to other gender identities because of it. i was wondering though if some afab people don’t feel their gender and still identify as afab? i think i’m agender but their most common experience is feeling like a human not a gender and i don’t get that i don’t think? i’m not sure? i also don’t feel dysphoria so sometimes it feels like i just want to be special and i am actually afab, is this something others do?

I think there are definitely people who don’t feel like their agab, but don’t feel a need to come out. Part of that might be the safety of the closet, but part of that might also be that coming out is a lot of work, and if saying that you’re your agab even when you’re not works for you, sometimes it’s easier to just go along with that. No one is obligated to identify a certain way, or come out if they’re not comfortable.

That said, figuring out if you’re agender or not can definitely be tricky, because it can be hard to notice the absence of a thing, so I can definitely empathize with you. Rather than worrying about if you feel like a human instead of feeling like a particular gender, it might be easier for you to focus on answering the question “what gender do i feel?/what gender do i feel like?”. If the answer is “none” or “agender”, that’s a pretty good indication that you might be agender.

Some agender people feel dysphoria, and some don’t, so not feeling dysphoria doesn’t somehow make it “harder” for you to be agender. Dysphoria can also be sneaky and hard to pin down as dysphoria, since it can be easy to come up with alternative explantations for why you feel how you do, so I wouldn’t worry about it too much.

I can’t say whether you’re a cis girl or not, since only you can determine that; however, I can point out most cis girls don’t question their gender enough to come across the term agender, confuse themselves to the point of thinking they’re agender, and send an ask about it to a Tumblr blog. If you still think you’re just a confused cis person, try comparing your own experiences to some of these cisgender experiences.

Hope that helps, as always feel free to ask for clarification/any follow up questions.

Not sure if you can help but I thought it was worth a shot. I’m ply aroacespec and when I first realized that I was fine but as time passes I find that identifying as aroace at all seems pointless. If I’m interested in dating and not opposed to having sex despite not really experiencing attraction, I feel I’m essentially no different from ply ppl who aren’t aroace. Would IDing as ply only be wrong? Is not wanting to public as aroacespec internalized aphobia? I’m just worried my logic is flawed.

I don’t think it would wrong for you to just identify as ply, but it’s worth thinking about, why do you want to ID as ply only? Why do you not want to be out as aroacespec? There are definitely answers that have to do with internalized aphobia, so if you think that’s part of the reason you feel this way, you might find it helpful to talk with other people in the community about their experiences and how they overcame internalize aphobia.

That said, I think there are reasons that don’t have to do with internalized aphobia, and that’s okay. If you find that, despite not really experiencing attraction, you don’t feel super connected to aspec labels because your behavior is similar enough to that of allos, you don’t have to use aspec labels. If you don’t want to go through a bunch of explanation of aspec theory and how attraction isn’t behavior when talking to partners or potential partners, you don’t have to disclose that part of yourself. (In fact, you never have to disclose being aspec if you don’t want to.)

It’s also worth noting that you can use different labels in different situations. For example, I’m agenderflux demigirl, but explaining that to people can be a nightmare sometimes if I really just wanted them to use they/them pronouns for me, so most of the time I tell people that I’m nonbinary and don’t go into specifics. Similarly, you can publicly identify as ply, and let some people know that you’re aroacespec but don’t use that label much as a publicly-facing identity (assuming that you still feel connected to be aroacespec).

Hope that helps, as always feel free to ask for clarification/any follow up questions.

I'm the anon who asked about being/not wanting to be agender, and while writing out that ask and reading your answer, I realised I think I actually like not having a gender identity, maybe I'd technically be agender, or quiogender or apogender, but I prefer just being...me, no gender or labels, if that makes sense? Anyway, thanks for helping me figure that out!